


The Gilded Tithe

by demonstarrr26



Category: A Court of Thorns and Roses Series - Sarah J. Maas
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon Rewrite, Everyone Is Gay, Gender or Sex Swap, M/M, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-24
Updated: 2021-02-24
Packaged: 2021-03-14 10:54:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,014
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29666193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/demonstarrr26/pseuds/demonstarrr26
Summary: To break the curse on his court, Tamlin must find the strongest possible mortal man and break him into sexual submission.
Relationships: feyre/everyone
Kudos: 1





	The Gilded Tithe

I went to the woods to slay a bride-prince.  
The tangled trees of the royal forest, laced together like a fan of knives, underfallen with cold, crunching snow, seemed an odd place for a young man to contemplate matrimony. Truth be told, the woods—especially the sections where commoners like myself were forbidden to hunt on pain of death—were my natural element.   
Father had taught me to track boar and elk since I stood high as his knee. I lived for the hunt, for the kill. Red blood on the snow, hair on my skinning knife, antlers hung above my fire. Another man might have used his skills to win praise—the high spirits know my brothers, feeble hunters all, still bragged about their kills in town, while not engaging in doomed business ventures, bankrupting our poor mother.   
To me, only weak men needed praise. A strong man needed only his shoulders and tracks in the underbrush. A strong man needed only to provide for the family depending on him.  
So no matter how my brothers wasted our coin, how my mother spent her days weeping at the fire, I brought home my kills to our once-great house.   
And now, I would kill a beast valuable enough to prove to Clythia’s family I could provide for her. I would win her hand and marry the kindest, sweetest, most beautiful woman in town. The one who had chosen me, Feyren, a silent, unsmiling, fair-haired giant of a man over all the richer and more charming suitors at her door.   
And I had to do it swiftly. Before her father discovered the child I’d planted in her belly and disowned her.   
My target was a beast, a massive, hulking monster that had slunk into town and slain three calves before it was driven off by a pack of spearmen. Great and gold and green-horned it were, and many speculated it came from Prythian, the faerie lands of the north. I cared not. I wanted nothing to do with the foul, wretched monsters who once held humanity in thrall. Power they might have, but only a soft power, of glamour and illusion. Mine was the might of iron, steel, and ash, especially the quiver of ash-wood arrows hanging at my back. An enchanted pelt would only bring a greater price.  
The great beast’s trail, I had found at sunrise, by a babbling brook. Only catching glimpses of its hide between the trees, vivid and invasive in my grey world, I had tracked it up a winding slope, wending north. In the knee-deep drifts, I had lost my way and doubled back more than once, letting the creature slip ahead. But soon it would tire and rest. I did not intend for it to evade me for long.  
I drew my bow as I topped a small hill. Here, the footprints were fresh. If I simply looked over the crest, I would find my prey.  
And I did—but the beast was not alone.   
A pavilion tent had been placed at the bottom of the hill, banners flapping: purple emblazoned with a golden eye. The sigil of the king who ruled our lands. It would have seemed a grand erection, were it not for the gold-furred monster, dwarfing the tent with its heady bulk. Even the man in the fine fur coat—who I recognized as Prince Jurian, ringed by guards and servants—seemed dwarfed before it.   
“You cannot change the treaty at a whim, creature,” said the prince. “The sacrifices have never cost so dearly—“  
“I am upholding the treaty,” the creature growled. “Every generation, each family of human rulers must send a child into Prythian to serve as a High Lord’s concubine. We have always asked for daughters: this generation, we require sons. That humans put more value on their male children is no fault of mine.”  
So the creature was a fairy, come to collect the traditional payment from the kings and queens of mortal lands: a prince or princess every generation. Nothing that concerned me.  
My shoulder ached from holding the bow taut, yet I held steady. If the monster lunged, only my arrow would be swift enough to save the prince’s life.  
“My family has no other son save myself,” insisted the prince. “Surely one of my sisters will do. Someone must stay behind to inherit the kingdom.”  
“Surely one of your sisters can do that,” said the beast. “I will return in three days. You will meet me here, or your whole kingdom will suffer.”  
I had never seen the prince, save at a distance. Never realized how alike we looked. The same pale skin, broad shoulders, red-blond hair. Firm jaws, long noses, heavy brows. If not for my hunting leathers and his fine furs, we might have been twins  
My jaw dropped. Shock flooded me, so intense I made a terrible mistake—releasing my bowstring. The arrow pierced a nearby tree trunk. Birds shot, calling, into the sky.  
The camp below turned.   
The beast locked eyes with me. Its gold-green gaze hit like a horse trampling on my chest. I almost shook. Quailed. I couldn’t let myself show fear—as a man, as a hunter, with a wife-to-be and child to protect, and yet something about this creature left me trembling in my bones.  
“Poacher!” shouted the prince. “Spy! Arrest him and bring him to me!”  
I cursed, wheeling on my heel, sprinting down the slope back the way I had came. My legs churned, strong and powerful, through the drifts. Horns and horses called behind me as huntmen stirred to give chase, but I had the advantage. I knew this land. I could evade them for now.  
But even I couldn’t evade them forever.  
He had seen me hunting in his woods. He had seen me break the law. Which meant my life was his to do as pleased, if he caught me, and the prince was well known for his perverted desires.  
So why, between him and the great horned beast, did I fear the monster even more?


End file.
